A Full Overview of Business Process Management (BPM)

Managing business processes is a huge challenge in most organizations. Businesses aren’t investing enough efforts in streamlining their business processes due to the lack of awareness about its repercussions. Here’s a definitive guide to managing your business processes with the help of automation.

What is Business Process Management (BPM)?

Business Process Management (BPM) is how a company creates, edits, and analyzes the predictable processes that make up the core of its business.

Each department in a company is responsible for taking some raw material or data and transforming it into something else. There may be a dozen or more core processes that each department handles.

With Business Process Management, a company takes a step back and looks at all of these processes in total and individually. It analyzes the current state and identifies areas of improvement to create a more efficient and effective organization.

How does Kissflow differ from other BPM tools?

Unlike other BPM tools that help you manage only standardized processes, Kissflow offers its users a unique platform that combines structured but ongoing workflows (process), manual workflows (case), and structured, one-off workflows (project). All these are tied together with a channel-based collaborative tool. You can bring all forms of work under one roof and ensure that everything is streamlined and smooth.

Is this like task management with Trello and Asana?

Task management is about handling or organizing a set of activities that arise out of a project. These projects are often one-time and non-repeatable. When these projects are well-organized like in construction work, a project management software like ‘Microsoft Project’ is used. Trello and Asana are good tools for managing tasks in ad-hoc projects.

Business Process Management is focused more on repetitive and ongoing processes that follow a predictable pattern, or process management.

Why does business process management matter?

When left unorganized and unsystematized, poor business processes can lead to mayhem. At the individual level, people only see one part of a process, and very few can scan out and see the full effects of a process, where it starts and ends, the key data needed, and where potential bottlenecks and inefficiencies lie.

Unmanaged, chaotic processes hurt business and lead to one or more of these scenarios:

Time wasted

More errors

Increased blame

Lack of data

Demoralized employees

Applying business process management organizations can improve their processes and keep all aspects of operations running optimally.

BPM Life Cycle:

Here are the steps in business process management:

Step 1: Design

Most processes include a form to collect data and a workflow to process it. Build your form and identify who will own each task in the workflow.

Step 2: Model

Represent the process in a visual layout. Fix details like deadlines and conditions to give a clear idea of the sequence of events, and the flow of data through the process.

Step 3: Execute

Execute the process by testing it live with a small group first and then open it up to all users. Make sure you restrict access to sensitive information.

Step 4: Monitor

Keep an eye on the process as it runs through the workflow. Use the right metrics to identify progress, measure efficiency, and locate bottlenecks. Here is a more detailed article about this step.

What are the various types of business process management?

BPM systems can be categorized based on the purpose that they serve. Here are the three types of business process management:

Integration-Centric BPM:

This type of business process management system handles processes that primarily jump between your existing systems (e.g. HRMS, CRM, ERP) without much human involvement. Integration-centric business process management systems have extensive connectors and API access to be able to create processes that move fast.

Human-Centric BPM:

Human-centric BPM is for those processes that are primarily executed by humans. These often have a lot of approvals and tasks performed by individuals. These platforms excel at a friendly user interface, easy notifications, and quick tracking.

Document-Centric BPM:

These business process management solutions are required when a document (e.g. a contract or agreement) is at the heart of the process. They enable routing, formatting, verifying, and getting the document signed as the tasks pass along the workflow.

Most business process management systems will be able to incorporate elements of each of these, but each one will usually have one specialty.

Business process management examples:

HR:

Have you ever felt your organization’s onboarding process is too complex and chaotic? Is your HR department asking the candidates to fill out paper forms that make them exhausted? This is because your HR department lacks the principle of Business Process Management (BPM). Applying business process management, helps you automate your HR processes end-to-end, thereby cutting down on cost, time, and paper forms. Given below are a couple of examples as to how business process management helps your HR department to improve their processes:

Sales:

In most organizations, the sales team spends a significant amount of time in coordinating with the Accounts Receivable (AR) team, to get sales invoices approved. Even a small typo in invoices, ruins the lives of the salespeople. This is where business process management comes into the picture, since it automates the invoice approval process, thereby eliminating the chances of manual errors and the back and forth clarifications between the salespeople and the AR team. Given below are a couple of scenarios in the sales department, where business process management can help them streamline their processes:

Finance:

Finance team is the one that is bombarded with paper forms and emails every day, since anything that involves money has to go through them. For instance, if the asset management team wants to purchase 50 laptops, they send the quotation that they received from the vendor to the finance team, for them to approve it. This is just one case. Imagine, how many such emails or paper forms they would be receiving on a daily basis from various teams. Without a system in place, it’ll be cumbersome for them to manage all of these. The one that helps them manage these processes is essentially the business process management (BPM) system. Given below are a couple of scenarios in the finance department, where business process management comes as a saving grace:

You need to understand what a good business process management system should have, and what you should be looking for. Search for key features from different vendors and discover your unique requirements.

The top 5 BPM Software: how do they compare?

Now that you know why exactly a BPM system is necessary, the question is which one to get. To help you make this rather tricky choice, here’s a list we’ve compiled. You’ll see 5 of our top picks for competent BPM software, compared head to head.

Brand Name

Popular With

Process Design

Operational Ease

Pricing

Support

Nintex

SMBs, enterprise

Browser-based intuitive design

On-prem

By quote

None (open-sourced)

Process Maker

Corporations, governments, and organizations looking for an enterprise scale

Is BPM really expensive?

Usually, yes. Business process management (BPM) system can get quite complex. Installing an on-premise solution might cost more than $250,000 after technology and consultant costs are included. But, the complete Kissflow Process starts at just $390/month to make BPM much more affordable. Plus, there’s no extra fees for support.Why don’t you give it a try? Pick a process that has been hard for you to automate and get started with Kissflow today.